Birmingham was
laid down at the
Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company at
Newport News, Virginia on 17 February 1941. The completed hull was
launched on 20 March 1942.
Fitting-out work was completed less than a year later, by which time she had been moved to the
Norfolk Naval Shipyard, and she was
commissioned there on 29 January 1943. Captain
John E. Wilkes served as the ship's first commander. On 20 February,
Birmingham embarked on her
shakedown cruise in the
Chesapeake Bay, which also included gunnery tests to confirm the structural integrity of her main battery turrets, practice launching and recovering her seaplanes, and shooting practice for her gun crews. On 19 March, the ship sailed for
Annapolis, Maryland, to be inspected, before returning to Norfolk on 3 April for repairs. Another round of initial training followed in the Chesapeake from 23 April, including night firing practice, refueling at sea, and fighter director exercises. In late May, she returned to Norfolk for additional repairs, before departing on 8 June for the
Mediterranean Sea to join forces then engaged in the
Mediterranean Theater.
World War II European Theater Birmingham reached
Mers El Kébir in
French Algeria on 22 June, where she made preparations to join the invasion fleet that was to conduct
Operation Husky, the invasion of
Sicily. She was assigned to Task Group (TG) 86.1, along with the light cruiser and the
destroyers and , which sortied on 29 June. The ships escorted part of the invasion force, which arrived off the landing beaches on the morning of 9 July. TG 86.1 helped guide the landing ships to their designated beaches, after which
Birmingham shifted to shore bombardment to cover their approach. She launched two of her seaplanes to help spot the fall of shot and search for Axis artillery batteries. During operations off the invasion beaches,
Birmingham was escorted by
Ludlow and the destroyer . Poor visibility hampered the cruiser's gunners, and her aircraft were repeatedly engaged by friendly forces that mistook them for hostile planes. At 07:15, one of the aircraft returned to
Birmingham, having been badly damaged by friendly ground fire and a German
Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter, and half an hour later, the second seaplane withdrew as well, having nearly been shot down by a pair of British
Bell P-39 Airacobra fighters. At 09:18,
Birmingham checked her fire, as Allied ground forces had achieved their initial objectives by that time. The ship continued to operate off the Sicilian coast for the next nine days, providing fire support to ground forces as they fought their way inland, and protecting
minesweepers as they cleared Axis mines from the area.
Birmingham left the waters off Sicily on 21 July to refuel at
Bizerte in
French Tunisia; she thereafter sailed to
Algiers in French Algeria before moving on to Mers El Kébir. On 27 July, she departed for the United States, arriving in Norfolk on 8 August, where she underwent repairs that lasted for ten days. From there, she sailed to join the forces engaged with Japan in the Pacific Ocean. She passed through the
Panama Canal on 22 August and reached
Pearl Harbor in Hawaii on 5 September.
Pacific Theater After arriving in Pearl Harbor,
Birmingham was assigned to TG 15.1 as part of the escort for the
aircraft carrier and the
light carriers and . The unit sortied on 11 September to launch a raid on Japanese positions at
Tarawa and
Makin, returning to Pearl Harbor on 23 September. After refueling and rearming, they sortied again on 29 September to attack
Wake Island.
Birmingham was detached from the carrier group on 5 October to carry out shore bombardments of the island, targeting coastal batteries and storage dumps. Her spotter aircraft came under attack by a
Mitsubishi A6M Zero, but the spotter was only hit by two bullets from the Zero before it escaped. TG 15.1 left the area on 6 October and arrived back in Pearl Harbor five days later.
Solomon Islands operations Birmingham was reassigned to the
Solomon Islands campaign, and she got underway on 21 October to join the naval forces operating there. She reached
Espiritu Santo on 4 November, and the next day joined the escort for a
convoy of six transport ships headed to
Bougainville; two other light cruisers and four destroyers comprised the rest of the escort group. The group safely arrived in
Empress Augusta Bay on the morning of 8 November and while they were unloading their cargoes,
Birmingham and the other escorts patrolled to the southwest of the bay. Throughout the afternoon and early evening,
Birmingham and her
sister ship detected a total of thirteen Japanese aircraft in the distance, but none of them attacked the Allied flotilla during this period. At around 18:30, a Japanese
Mitsubishi G4M medium bomber closed with the American ships. At the same time, the air-search radars on the American cruisers picked up a large attack force incoming, at a distance of about .
Birmingham and the other two cruisers opened fire with their main batteries at 19:11, at a range of , to try to disrupt the incoming aerial attack. As the Japanese aircraft closed in the darkness, the American ships launched
flares to illuminate the planes.
Birmingham engaged an
Aichi D3A Val that was approaching the ship and inflicted fatal damage with her 20 mm and 40 mm guns, though not before the Val released its bomb. It skipped on the water and struck
Birminghams hull on the starboard quarter; the explosion tore a hole in the hull that was wide and destroyed her aircraft
hangar. Almost immediately after, another aircraft hit
Birmingham with a
torpedo on her port
bow, blowing a hole and causing significant damage to the hull structure. Two of her
fuel oil storage compartments were also flooded. The ship's
damage control teams quickly moved to contain the flooding and suppress fires from both hits, but a second Val made an attack run at
Birmingham. The anti-aircraft gunners destroyed the plane as it dove on
Birmingham, but its bomb nevertheless struck turret #4. The mount and all three gun barrels were damaged in the blast. In total, the three attacks killed two men and wounded another thirty-two.
Birmingham was still able to steam at and maintain her position in the formation. Further Japanese attacks occurred throughout the night, but the ships' 5-inch guns kept the aircraft at bay. At 19:58,
Birmingham shot down a G4M that was dropping flares over the formation, and later that night her 5-inch guns destroyed another G4M at a range of .
Birmingham withdrew without further damage, and reached the central Solomons by the morning; from there, the ships sailed on to
Florida Island on 10 November. There, the ship received temporary repairs to shore up the damaged
bulkheads. A vent for the flooded compartments in the bow was also created to reduce pressure on the forward bulkheads, and while steaming back to the United States, it created periodic geysers of water, which earned the ship the nickname "
Old Faithful".
Birmingham left Florida on 16 November for Espiritu Santo, though she stayed there only briefly before continuing on to Hawaii, which she reached on 1 December.
Repairs and training The ship was
dry docked in Pearl Harbor for repairs to her hull, and on 18 December she departed for the
Mare Island Navy Yard in
San Francisco, California, arriving there four days later. There, she underwent permanent repairs, including six new 6-inch guns and new
aircraft catapults. On 7 February 1944, while she was being moved in the harbor,
Birmingham accidentally collided with the merchant vessel , and had her bow damaged again. Further repairs were necessitated, which lasted about a week. She thereafter conducted a short shakedown cruise before sailing from Mare Island on 18 February to return to Pearl Harbor, arriving there on 23 February. The ship thereafter took part in training exercises off
Kahoolawe in the Hawaiian islands before leaving Hawaii on 5 March. She sailed next to the
Ellice Islands, refueling at
Funafuti on 10 March, before continuing on to the Solomons. She arrived in
Purvis Bay there four days later, where she was assigned to Task Group 53.1.
Birmingham spent the next two months conducting training exercises in preparation for upcoming
amphibious invasions planned for the
Marianas Islands. These exercises included shore bombardment practice and coordination practice between shore-based fire control teams and the ship's gunners, along with bombardments of Japanese positions on the
Shortland Islands in company with her sisters and and four destroyers. During this action, she engaged in a gunnery duel with shore batteries on the island. On 24 May, she took part in a large-scale simulated amphibious invasion on
Guadalcanal, which included live-fire practice in
Kula Gulf. On 3 June, the ship returned to Purvis Bay, by which time some fifty men aboard the vessel were suffering from
bacillary dysentery. As a result, the ship's medical team
fumigated the ship to kill disease-carrying insects. The next day, she sortied as part of the escort for a convoy of transports and
Landing Ships, Tank bound for the
Marshall Islands, which were being used as the staging ground for the upcoming invasion of the Marianas. Dysentary continued to spread among the crew, and by 10 June, a total of 244 men had been infected. She nevertheless sailed that day as part of the invasion fleet.
Mariana and Palau Islands campaign Birmingham was transferred to TG 52.17, which arrived off
Saipan on 14 June for the imminent
invasion of Saipan; the ship protected minesweepers clearing Japanese mines off the island and covered
Underwater Demolition Teams (UDT) clearing obstacles around the landing beaches. She also fired on Japanese positions in the area. The next day,
Birmingham cruised off
Garapan to cover UDTs on the beach and engaged Japanese coastal artillery and anti-aircraft guns in the area. She then closed to from shore, and at 08:46, she came under heavy fire from several Japanese guns. The ship received light damage to her upper works, but quickly returned fire, and over the course of the next two hours, silenced most of the guns and destroyed two ammunition dumps being used to supply them. In the course of the action, she had fired 1,345 rounds from her main battery and 1,172 shells from her secondary guns. Later in the day, she again closed with the beach to draw fire from shore guns, which were then engaged by American carrier planes. On 16 June,
Birmingham returned to the invasion beaches and joined the shore bombardment group that supported the ground forces as they went ashore.
Birmingham shelled Japanese positions near an airfield as
marines fought to secure it. By 09:00, her crew had begun coordinating with a ground-based fire control team, and the ship spent the rest of the day responding to fire support requests. Later that day, she was assigned to Task Unit 52.1.1, which spent the next two days bombarding Japanese positions on Saipan and neighboring
Tinian. By that time, the US had received reports of a large scale Japanese counteroffensive approaching from the Philippines.
Birmingham accordingly withdrew to replenish ammunition and stores from the
attack cargo ship before rejoining the fleet on 17 June. s from American and Japanese aircraft during the
Battle of the Philippine Sea, seen from
Birmingham The ship joined TG 58.3, which was centered on the aircraft carrier and the light carriers
Princeton and . The fleet had positioned itself some to the west of the Marianas to protect the invasion force. Japanese patrol aircraft located the American fleet on the morning of 19 June and, in the ensuing
Battle of the Philippine Sea, launched a series of air strikes, but American
combat air patrols intercepted most of them before they reached the fleet. After shooting down hundreds of Japanese aircraft, the American aircraft launched strikes of their own against the Japanese carriers on 20 June and inflicted further losses on the Japanese fleet, including the sinking of the carrier . The American aircraft arrived back at their carriers late in the evening and faced difficult night landings;
Birmingham assisted by lighting signal smoke pots, and she also put life rafts to rescue pilots who had to ditch their aircraft at sea. The Americans pursued the retreating Japanese on 21 June, but were unable to catch them and returned to the Marianas.
Birmingham next left the fleet on 26 June in company with three destroyers to shell Japanese positions on Tinian, particularly in
Tinian Town, the main settlement on the island. They also used
white phosphorus shells to set fire to
sugar cane fields near the town, and they sank five
sampans in port. The Americans then withdrew to replenish ammunition before returning to Tinian the next day for further bombardments. Over the course of the day's shelling, the ships destroyed about seventy-five percent of Tinian Town and burned much of the surrounding farmland.
Birmingham moved back to Saipan on 28 June and resumed gunfire support duties off Garapan, which she carried out for the next several days. These operations included destroying three Japanese
tanks on 5 July. The next day,
Birmingham returned to Tinian to resume attacks on that island through the day, before withdrawing later in the evening. With Saipan under American control, the ship next joined the bombardment group covering the
invasion of Guam on 21 July. She attacked Japanese positions on the island as American troops went ashore but encountered little return fire. On 23 July, she returned to Saipan to begin preparatory bombardments for the
invasion of Tinian, which took place two days later. During the preparatory phase,
Birmingham closed with the shore and used her 20 mm and 40 mm guns to attack Japanese trench lines. On the 25th, one of her spotter aircraft estimated that the ship had killed approximately 250 soldiers. She remained off Tinian through 1 August, bombarding Japanese forces as American troops fought to secure the island. In the course of operations during the campaign,
Birmingham fired a total of 7,683 rounds from her main guns and 10,875 shells from her 5-inch guns. On 7 August,
Birmingham got underway, bound for Eniwetok for maintenance and to replenish ammunition and stores in preparation for the next stage of the campaign. She then joined TG 38.5, which sortied on 3 September to attack the
Palau Islands in the western
Carolines. She joined the screen for the carriers and
Lexington and the light carrier , which carried out a series of air strikes on
Angaur,
Pelelieu, and
Babeldaob between 6 and 7 September. These marked the beginning of preparatory attacks leading to the
invasion of Pelelieu the following week. The Fast Carrier Task Force moved on to attack airfields in the southern Philippines, both to draw Japanese attention away from Palau and to neutralize aircraft that might interfere with the invasion. These attacks began on 9 September. During one of these raids, aircraft spotted a Japanese convoy of small coastal vessels off
Mindanao;
Birmingham, her sister , and the destroyers , , , and were detached to intercept it. American aircraft helped direct the ships to their target, and in the course of the action,
Birmingham sank three cargo ships, a large sampan, and a small motor boat, and she assisted in the destruction of eight smaller vessels.
Birmingham and the rest of the ships returned to the carriers, which continued to strike targets in the Philippines through 12 September. During this period,
Birmingham used one of her seaplanes to recover a downed pilot from the carrier . The fleet returned to the Carolines for further strikes there, before resuming attacks on the Philippines later in September. On 27 September, the fleet withdrew to the
Kossol Roads to refuel and replenish ammunition.
Philippines campaign on 24 October 1944 The fleet then moved north to its next staging ground at
Ulithi, and
Birmingham arrived there on 2 October. There, she was assigned to TG 38.3, which sortied the next day to carry out an attack on the
Ryukyu Islands. This raid was intended to reduce Japanese forces in the region that might interfere with the planned
invasion of Leyte in the Philippines. The Fast Carrier Task Force arrived off the Ryukyus on 10 October and inflicted significant damage to Japanese aircraft and installations on the islands. The following day, the carriers turned their attention to the island of
Luzon in the Philippines, striking airfields there and then shifting once again to
Formosa on 12 October. The
Formosa Air Battle continued into the next day, which saw intense Japanese counterattacks that damaged the
heavy cruiser .
Birmingham was among the vessels detached to cover the withdrawal of
Canberra, which was towed by the heavy cruiser . The carriers' combat air patrol kept Japanese aircraft at bay, but later that morning,
Birmingham left the
Canberra group to cover the withdrawal of her sister , which had also been badly damaged by a Japanese
torpedo bomber. The ships were still retreating on 16 October when they came under attack once again;
Birmingham shot down a
Nakajima B6N torpedo bomber, but it had already hit
Houston with another torpedo.
Birmingham also assisted in the destruction of another B6N that had attempted to attack
Santa Fe.
Birmingham left the withdrawing formation on 17 October and rejoined TG 38.3, where she refueled at sea from the oiler . The Fast Carrier Task Force then covered the invasion of Leyte from 19 October, carrying out air strikes on various targets through the Philippines. Japanese air forces launched a series of counterattacks on 24 October, and during one of these, a
Yokosuka D4Y dive bomber scored a hit on
Princeton that caused serious damage and several large fires;
Birmingham and the three destroyers
Morrison, and remained with the stricken carrier after she fell out of formation. The destroyers initially attempted to come alongside and spray the burning carrier to help the ship's crew suppress the fires, but they repeatedly collided with
Princeton in the heavy seas.
Birmingham then came alongside instead, as her larger hull could better absorb collisions. She sent thirty-eight men and fourteen water hoses over to
Princeton, and they helped the carrier's crew put out one of the two large fires. Later in the day,
Birmingham received reports of Japanese aircraft approaching, and around the same time, one of the destroyers reported detecting a
submarine just away.
Birmingham immediately pulled away from
Princeton so she could evade any incoming attacks. Only one Japanese aircraft actually approached the formation, but it did not attack, and the submarine report was determined to have been a false alarm.
Birmingham then returned alongside
Princeton to resume firefighting, but at 15:22, just as she was coming back alongside
Princeton, the fires reached the carrier's aft
magazines, setting off a catastrophic explosion. The blast destroyed much of the carrier's stern, throwing debris all along
Birminghams starboard side and inflicting grave casualties among the cruiser's crew. Out of her crew of nearly 1,300, 241 men were killed, 211 were seriously wounded, and 201 received lighter injuries, more than half of the crew. The surviving crew began fighting several fires aboard
Birmingham and treating the survivors, and then she broke off from the stricken carrier. Efforts continued aboard
Princeton, but these ultimately proved futile, and
Reno and
Irwin scuttled her with torpedoes.
Birmingham eventually arrived back at Mare Island in early November for repairs; during this period, she also received modifications to allow her to serve as a
flagship. Her propulsion system was also overhauled, and she received all new 5- and 6-inch gun barrels, along with additional 20- and 40-millimeter gun mounts. Work on the ship was completed on 17 January 1945.
Battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa After returning to service,
Birmingham briefly cruised off San Francisco to calibrate her equipment, before moving to
San Diego for combat practice on 24 January. Over the next week, her crew took part in anti-aircraft gunnery drills, practicing operating her seaplanes, and other exercises, before departing on 4 February to rejoin the fleet. She stopped briefly in Pearl Harbor on the way, and arrived at Saipan on 25 February to refuel. The following day, she reached the fleet off
Iwo Jima, where the
Battle of Iwo Jima was already in full swing. On 1 March, she joined the coastal bombardment force and began engaging Japanese targets on the island. She operated there for the next five days, during which time she destroyed Japanese defensive positions in support of a marine advance on 1 March, supported another offensive on the eastern side of the island on 3 March, and shelled Japanese held caves from a distance of on 4 March. By that time, the marines had secured the airfield on the southern end of the island. On 5 March, the heavy cruiser replaced
Birmingham in the shore bombardment unit, and the latter vessel departed for Ulithi. After arriving on 8 March, she began to make preparations for the planned attack on
Okinawa. She and the rest of the invasion fleet sortied on 21 March for the Ryukyus, arriving off the island four days later. She took part in a preparatory bombardment on the morning of 25 March, she retired to cover minesweepers clearing paths for the invasion craft. The next day, she joined a bombardment group that consisted of the battleships and , the light cruiser , and the heavy cruiser
Wichita, along with escorting destroyers. The unit was stationed off the western coast of Okinawa to support American ground forces there, which had not yet gone ashore. The American commanders believed that the Japanese units on the island might attempt to board vessels in the invasion fleet,
Birmingham distributed
M1918 Browning Automatic Rifles to the 20 mm and 40 mm gun crews to defend against boarders. On 26 March, numerous Japanese aircraft attacked the invasion fleet, and
Birminghams gunners contributed to the fleet's anti-aircraft defense. Later in the day, the bombardment group closed with the beaches to bombard Japanese defenses.
Birmingham repeated these attacks in different sectors on 28 and 29 March, and also covered the operation of UDT units preparing the invasion beaches. The assault began on the morning of 1 April, and at 06:08,
Birmingham opened fire on the target beaches. Shortly thereafter, a D3A bomber closed with the ship, but a 5-inch shell damaged the aircraft as it approached, slowing it so the 20 mm and 40 mm guns could take it under fire; the bomber exploded in mid-air some from the ship. Following the preparatory bombardment, the amphibious assault vessels began to go ashore, and
Birmingham transferred control of her guns to a fire direction party ashore; she spent the rest of the day responding to requests for fire support as the soldiers and marines fought their way inland. The ship remained off the island for the next several days, and on 6 April, she helped repel a large-scale aerial attack, during which her gunners shot down a D3A bomber and assisted with the destruction of three D4Y bombers. Planned fire support duty was canceled the following day when the American fleet received reports that the large battleship and several other vessels had sortied to attack the invasion fleet.
Birmingham was among the vessels assembled to block the Japanese flotilla should it break through; she and two cruisers and ten destroyers took up a screening position on the right
flank of the Allied fleet. At 19:11,
Birmingham received news that American carrier aircraft had sunk
Yamato, two light cruisers, and three destroyers, neutralizing the threat to the invasion beaches. She resumed bombardment duties the next day, remaining on station off the island until 12 April, when she was recalled to help defend the main fleet from a major Japanese air attack. During the action, her gunners claimed one Japanese aircraft.
Birmingham next moved to
Iejima to conduct preparatory bombardments over the following three days before American forces landed on 16 April. The ship then withdrew to
Kerama Retto to replenish ammunition and stores before returning to Okinawa to resume fire support missions there. These operations continued until 22 April, when she withdrew to Kerama Retto to take on more ammunition. She resumed bombarding Japanese positions on the island through the end of the month and into early May. These included attacks on the airfield at
Naha to disrupt Japanese operations there. On 4 May, another major Japanese counterattack appeared, and at around 08:40, a
Nakajima Ki-43 Hayabusa made a diving attack on
Birmingham; the pilot approached from such a steep angle that only the 20 mm guns could elevate high enough to engage the aircraft, and they lacked the power to destroy the plane before it crashed into the ship. The blast destroyed the ship's sick bay, penetrated three deck levels, and tore a hole in the hull below the
waterline on the starboard side. The resulting fires were quickly suppressed and seriously injured men were transferred to the
hospital ship . The killed fifty-two men and wounded another eighty-two.
Birmingham came alongside the salvage ship for temporary repairs before departing for
Guam on 5 May; she arrived there five days later, where she was dry-docked on 13 May.
End of the war and later career in December 1959, shortly after she was taken from the reserve fleet On 21 May,
Birmingham got underway to return to Pearl Harbor, arriving there seven days later. There, she was dry-docked at the
Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard on 7 June for repair work that lasted for six weeks. She emerged from the shipyard on 22 July, after which she took on ammunition, fuel, and stores before embarking on combat training in Hawaiian waters in preparation to resume operations against Japan. She departed Pearl Harbor on 12 August and joined TG 12.3, which was steaming to Wake Island, where she was to shell the isolated Japanese garrison there to practice gunnery drills. Three days later, while still en route to Wake, the ships received word that Japan had surrendered, so the attack on the island was called off. Over the course of her wartime career,
Birmingham was awarded eight
battle stars. The ship headed to Eniwetok, which she reached on 19 August. She refueled there and continued on to Okinawa, arriving there on 26 August. She was initially ordered to sail for
Kyushu to take part in the
occupation of Japan, and she got underway on 7 September, but while on the way her orders were changed to send her south to the naval forces stationed in Australia and
New Guinea.
Birmingham sailed south, passing through Leyte on 14 September to refuel, and continuing on until she reached
Brisbane, Australia, on 23 September. There, she became the flagship of
Rear Admiral Clifford E. Van Hook, the commander of US naval forces in Australia. She served in this capacity for the next five months, cruising between
Sydney,
Melbourne, and Brisbane. The ship eventually returned to San Francisco on 22 March 1946. On 2 April, she was moved to San Diego, where she was assigned to the 19th Fleet, to be prepared for decommissioning. On 16 October, she was assigned to the
Pacific Reserve Fleet, San Diego, and on 2 January 1947, she was formally decommissioned. She remained in the Navy's inventory for the next decade, ultimately being stricken from the
Naval Vessel Register on 1 March 1959.
Birmingham was then sold to the National Metals and Steel Corp. on 13 October to be
broken up for
scrap. ==Footnotes==